Study note on:- The Miracle Question, Answer it and change your life by Linda Metcalf,PhD.
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In 1990, Dr. Viktor Frankl, given a keynote address in a large psychotherapy conference in Anaheim, Clalifornia. Frankl told a story during this talk that mesmerize lot of audiance....
He had been transferred to four different concentration camps, watched his father die in one of the camps and been separated from his mother and his wife. His life as psychiatrist, writer and lecturer had been interrupted by his imprisonment. He held the view that spirituality and meaning were central to mental health, an idea that was new at the time. Before he had a chance to write about this new idea, he was arrested and imprisoned. He was determined to survive the war if at all possible not only to find his surviving family, but to propagate this idea.
On a wintry day in Poland, while interred in his fourth concentration camp, Frankl was being marched through a field with a group of other prisoners. He was dressed in thin clothing, with no socks, and he had holes in his shoes. Very ill from malnutrition and mistreatment, he began to cough. The cough was so severe that he fell to his knees. A guard came over and told him to get up and keep walking, but he could not even answer as his cough was so intense and debilitating. The guard began to beat him with a club and told him that he would be left to die if he did not get up. Dr. Frankl knew the guard was deadly serious as he had witnessed the same done to other prisoners. Sick, in pain, and being hit, he thought, "This is it for me." He didn't have the wherewithal to get up.
There he was on the ground in no condition to go on, and all of a sudden he was no longer in Poland. Instead, he found himself imagining himself standing at a lectern in post-war Vienna giving a lecture on "The Psychology of Death Camps and the Psychology of Meaning". He held and audience of 200 rapt with attention. The lecture was one that he had been working on the whole time he had been in the prison camps. He spoke about how some people, those who find meaning and a connection to a higher purpose, seem to survive the experience psychologically and emotionally better than others. It was a brilliant lecture, all taking place in his mind's eye and ear. He was no longer half-dead in the field but living in the lecture. During the lecture, he told the imaginary audience about the day Viktor Frankl was in that field being beaten and was certain he didn't have the strength to get up and keep walking.
Then, wonder of wonders, he told his imagined audience, he was able to stand up. The guard stopped beating him and he began, haltingly at first, then with more strength, to walk. As he was imagining describing this to his audience, his body got up and began to walk. He continued to imagine this lecture all the while he was doing the work detail and through the cold march back to the death camp. He collapsed into his bunk, imagining this brilliantly clear speech ending and him getting a standing ovation. Many years later and thousands of miles away, in 1990 in Anaheim, California, he received a standing ovation from 7,000 people after this speech.
What did Viktor Frankl do that most people with problem don't do? He vividly imagine a future in which his problems were resolved and then worked backwards to the present to determine what he would need to do in order to make that future a reality.---------------------------------- End of Excerpt ---------------------------------
---------------------------- excerpt ---------------------------------
In 1990, Dr. Viktor Frankl, given a keynote address in a large psychotherapy conference in Anaheim, Clalifornia. Frankl told a story during this talk that mesmerize lot of audiance....
He had been transferred to four different concentration camps, watched his father die in one of the camps and been separated from his mother and his wife. His life as psychiatrist, writer and lecturer had been interrupted by his imprisonment. He held the view that spirituality and meaning were central to mental health, an idea that was new at the time. Before he had a chance to write about this new idea, he was arrested and imprisoned. He was determined to survive the war if at all possible not only to find his surviving family, but to propagate this idea.
On a wintry day in Poland, while interred in his fourth concentration camp, Frankl was being marched through a field with a group of other prisoners. He was dressed in thin clothing, with no socks, and he had holes in his shoes. Very ill from malnutrition and mistreatment, he began to cough. The cough was so severe that he fell to his knees. A guard came over and told him to get up and keep walking, but he could not even answer as his cough was so intense and debilitating. The guard began to beat him with a club and told him that he would be left to die if he did not get up. Dr. Frankl knew the guard was deadly serious as he had witnessed the same done to other prisoners. Sick, in pain, and being hit, he thought, "This is it for me." He didn't have the wherewithal to get up.
There he was on the ground in no condition to go on, and all of a sudden he was no longer in Poland. Instead, he found himself imagining himself standing at a lectern in post-war Vienna giving a lecture on "The Psychology of Death Camps and the Psychology of Meaning". He held and audience of 200 rapt with attention. The lecture was one that he had been working on the whole time he had been in the prison camps. He spoke about how some people, those who find meaning and a connection to a higher purpose, seem to survive the experience psychologically and emotionally better than others. It was a brilliant lecture, all taking place in his mind's eye and ear. He was no longer half-dead in the field but living in the lecture. During the lecture, he told the imaginary audience about the day Viktor Frankl was in that field being beaten and was certain he didn't have the strength to get up and keep walking.
Then, wonder of wonders, he told his imagined audience, he was able to stand up. The guard stopped beating him and he began, haltingly at first, then with more strength, to walk. As he was imagining describing this to his audience, his body got up and began to walk. He continued to imagine this lecture all the while he was doing the work detail and through the cold march back to the death camp. He collapsed into his bunk, imagining this brilliantly clear speech ending and him getting a standing ovation. Many years later and thousands of miles away, in 1990 in Anaheim, California, he received a standing ovation from 7,000 people after this speech.
What did Viktor Frankl do that most people with problem don't do? He vividly imagine a future in which his problems were resolved and then worked backwards to the present to determine what he would need to do in order to make that future a reality.---------------------------------- End of Excerpt ---------------------------------
